Renee watched the feed from the two remaining cameras at the storage unit. On the interior camera, she could see Kade walk through the now-empty outer room. He turned the knob on the door of the interior wall and immediately darted out the exterior door. She hadn’t realized he could move so fast.
Her eyes shifted briefly to the exterior view where a taxicab waited outside. Kade slipped from the door to the left, immediately disappearing into the shadows. She doubted even the cab driver had seen him move past the rear of the cab. If he had, all he would have seen was a dark blur of movement.
Inside, the interior door didn’t move for a full minute until Anthony dared peek through it. Several more seconds ticked by before he crossed the room and walked outside.
His steps quickened when he saw the cab. An instant later, he was in the backseat and the cab’s engine started. The vehicle was barely out of view before a shadow appeared near the exterior door.
Kade came into view long enough for her to watch him deactivate the surveillance camera and then repeat the process with the second one inside.
Expecting Kade would take at least a half hour to return, Renee checked the time on her computer: 2:45 a.m. She knew she should get some sleep but doubted she would be able to relax until she knew Kade was safely home.
Home. She replayed the word through her mind and looked around the narrow kitchen. Two weeks ago, she had considered her apartment in Great Falls home, but she already knew she wouldn’t be able to return there. Even if the person trying to kill her was caught, knowing someone had violated that space was enough to strengthen her resolve to keep her address a secret, even from those she worked with.
She thought of her office at the CIA, and reality surfaced. She wasn’t going back there either. Her time working with the guardians, though intense at times, had given her a new sense of purpose. She loved seeing how the intelligence world unfolded in front of her eyes, and she loved being able to access such a huge volume of information. Here she could make a difference in a way she wasn’t sure she could with the CIA.
Where she would live next, she wasn’t sure, but she knew she needed to start looking for a new apartment before too long. She straightened in her seat as she contemplated her agency employment. Her address was classified. As with most employees, that personal information was not accessible to others, the exception being those who worked in personnel and had a need to know.
Renee closed down the surveillance program she had been using and logged into the guardian database. Even though she still had limited access, it didn’t take long for her to find what she was looking for: the personnel file of Sean Caspar.
Thirty-four years old, employed by the CIA for the past nine years. Graduated summa cum laude from Harvard, with his undergraduate degree in behavioral science, followed by a master’s in public management from Johns Hopkins.
He’d applied to the CIA during the summer before his second year at Johns Hopkins and was offered a job ten months later. His family was limited to a few aunts, uncles, and cousins, but both parents were already deceased, the mother from cancer when he was a teenager and the father from carbon monoxide poisoning the day after Caspar graduated from Johns Hopkins.
Despite the then-recent tragedy, he’d completed his final interview with the agency three days later and started work two weeks after that.
Renee continued to study the man’s background information until she heard a motorcycle engine outside.
Following Kade’s protocol, she opened the surveillance program again and checked the cameras set up around their campsite. As she suspected, it was Kade. He parked the motorcycle beside the cab rather than storing it, probably due to the late hour. A minute after, he climbed through the hatch.
“Everything quiet here while I was gone?” he asked.
“Yeah. I’ve been digging into Sean Caspar’s background,” she said. “Does it seem odd to you that he would get a degree from Harvard and a master’s from Johns Hopkins and then work for the CIA?”
“It’s unusual.” Kade set his backpack on his workbench and began unloading his equipment. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m not sure.” They both fell silent as Kade continued with his task and Renee pulled Sean Caspar up on social media. Her eyebrows drew together. “Can you do a comparison of two images on your facial recognition software?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“I want you to compare a photo of Caspar while he was in college to a recent photo.”
“You think it’s not the same person?”
“I’m wondering. He was very active on social media until right after his graduation ceremony. Then nothing.”
“Maybe he was too busy celebrating. And if he came on with the CIA close to that time, they could have told him to stop using the social media sites.”
“It’s possible, but I find it odd that he posted four photos from his graduation ceremony, eleven during the twenty minutes after that, and then nothing.”
Kade put the now-empty backpack away and crossed to his desk. “All right, message me the photos, and I’ll run them.”
Renee selected one from Caspar’s Harvard graduation, another from his graduation from Johns Hopkins, and a third from his DMV record the last time he renewed his driver’s license. As soon as she pressed Send, she pushed back from the table and moved to stand behind Kade so she could see him do the comparison.
“Looks like the same guy to me,” Kade said after a minute.
“It probably is, but there’s something fishy about the timing of everything. He graduates from a top school, his dad dies a day later, and he drops off the face of the planet as far as his social media presence.” Renee put a hand on the back of Kade’s chair. “When I joined the agency, we were told during orientation that we should gradually reduce our posts online so it wouldn’t look so odd to our friends. He would have received the same instruction since he started around the same time I did.”
“I thought he’d been with the agency a lot longer than you.”
She shook her head. “He started nine years ago. That’s only a year before I started my internship.”
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.” She saw his confusion. “The agency gave me a four-year internship right out of high school. I worked every summer there, and in exchange, they paid my tuition and a stipend while I was in college.”
“The CIA version of an ROTC scholarship.”
“Yeah.”
A chime sounded from Kade’s computer, and they both stared at the results. Eighty-eight percent likelihood of a match.
“I guess I was wrong,” Renee said, feeling foolish that she was dreaming up such extreme scenarios.
Kade’s response was to open another screen and access Caspar’s personnel file. He began another comparison, this time using the graduation photo from Johns Hopkins and the photo in his agency file. Again the results came back the same. Eighty-eight percent.
Kade swiveled in his chair to face her. “You aren’t wrong.”
“But it says . . .”
“It says 88 percent on two photos that were taken five days apart. For photos that close, we should be in the high nineties, minimum.”
“Does he have a twin?”
“No, but I bet he has a very talented plastic surgeon.” Kade stood and pressed a kiss to Renee’s forehead. “That’s good work.”
“I’m glad you think so because I came to a decision while you were gone.”
“What’s that?”
“I’ve decided I want to stay with the guardian program.”
His expression was oddly serious. “We’re lucky to have you.”
“Thanks.” A little unsettled by the intensity of his gaze, she motioned to the images on the screen. “Now what?”
“Now we get some sleep. I’ll talk to Ace in the morning about how we want to proceed.” He caught himself as though realizing he had used Ace’s name in front of her.
“I assume that’s the other ghost.”
“Yeah. Just make sure you call us Ghost if anyone else is around.”
“I can do that.” She gave him a small smile. “Can I call you Kade now?”
“I think I can live with that.” He put both hands on her shoulders and leaned down to press his lips to hers.
The kiss was brief but still managed to cause a flurry of butterflies to erupt in her stomach. Feeling off balance the moment he dropped his hands, she took a step back. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“It is morning.” Kade granted her a rare smile. “Try for six hours straight.”
“You too.” Renee retreated to the bedroom and closed the door between them. She dropped onto the bed, her pulse pounding in her head and her mind racing.
She ran her fingers through her hair. What was she thinking? The man in the other room could practically disappear into thin air; his conversational skills were rudimentary at best, so why did her heartbeat quicken when she thought of being with him?
She thought of his focus and dedication to his work and the dry humor that popped up at random times. Beneath his sometimes gruff exterior, he was a considerate man, even if he couldn’t see that trait in himself. And he’d brought her flowers.
She shook her head and struggled to find logic. She was simply passing through his life, and with the progress they had made today, their time together could quickly be coming to a close. Even though she had decided to continue working with the guardian program, she doubted she would interact with Kade directly.
Physically and mentally exhausted, she changed into the T-shirt Kade had given her to sleep in and climbed into bed. Closing her eyes, she hoped she would be able to find a clearer perspective on her future once she’d had a decent night’s sleep.